1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to validation of device authenticity and more particularly to electromagnetic profiling to validate electronic device authenticity.
The present application relates to application Ser. No. 12/404,851, entitled “Thermal Profiling to Validate Electronic Device Authenticity” by David B. Kumhyr, Yvonne M. Young and Glenn D. Johnson, filed concurrently with the present application.
2. Description of the Related Art
Much of the value found in electronic devices is developed during the design of the electronic devices rather than the manufacture of the electronic devices. For example, an integrated circuit processor often results from an intense and expensive development process, but the actual materials used to build the integrated circuit processor typically cost only a few dollars. To protect the investment made in development, integrated circuit manufacturers attempt to keep integrated circuit designs from becoming public so that counterfeiters cannot copy the designs and produce fake circuits. In some instances, however, counterfeiters reverse engineer the design or the functions performed by the design to create counterfeit devices. For example, switch and router electronic devices are built with many different kinds of electronic devices, such as integrated circuit processors, application specific integrated circuits (ASICs) and field programmable grid arrays (FPGAs). FPGAs are basically a collection of logical ports and functions, which can be combined in an arbitrary fashion to perform a specific function. A counterfeiter might assemble a router or switch device with a combination of authentic electronic devices that are difficult to counterfeit, such as processor components, and counterfeit devices that are somewhat easier to reverse engineer, such as FPGA components. A counterfeiter might also alter an existing electronic device by removing selected components and replacing the selected components with counterfeit components that include insidious functions. For example, FPGA functions are mimicked based on inputs and outputs by instead programming the functions into a sufficiently powerful but less expensive processor or microcontroller that includes additional functionality. A counterfeiter hides the misdeed by simply labeling the counterfeit microcontroller with the counterfeited FPGA identifier. An end user who purchases a device with counterfeit electronic device components often has no idea unless something goes wrong.
The presence of counterfeit electronic devices or electronic device components within an electronic device presents a number of business risks and security risks. With respect to business risks, an enterprise that purchases a device from a name brand manufacturer typically pays more for the device relative to competitive devices under the assumption that the name brand device has a higher quality with better performance and reliability. Manufacturers who have their products counterfeited risk a loss in reputation because of failures associated with counterfeit components. Components that do not function up to the original manufacture specifications expose the end user to unplanned outages and denial of warranty service, while the manufacturer is exposed to potential liability for fixing systems that the manufacturer did not build or sell. For example, the manufacturer may not recognize the counterfeit components or may elect to provide warranty service to protect its reputation. In addition, counterfeit electronic devices and altered electronic devices that include counterfeit components often have different electromagnetic interference (EMI) characteristics from an authentic unaltered electronic device. Counterfeit electronic devices and components can introduce EMI that exceeds Federal Communication Commission (FCC) limits and that interferes with the operation of other electronic components. Security risks arise where counterfeit equipment is altered to allow unauthorized access to the device or other malicious effects. A microcontroller that mimics FPGA functionality in a router or switch might include additional functionality that allows communication of information to unauthorized network addresses.